ecommerce – Gigaomhttp://gigaom.com
The industry leader in emerging technology researchThu, 24 May 2018 17:25:15 +0000en-UShourly1What’s a Store For?http://gigaom.com/2016/05/23/whats-a-store-for/
http://gigaom.com/2016/05/23/whats-a-store-for/#commentsMon, 23 May 2016 16:05:38 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=950110The first e-commerce transaction—a music CD, pizza, or weed, depending on who you ask—took place around thirty years ago. That means that first truly native ecommerce generation is now in charge of their own foot traffic and armed with at least one device that spares them the trouble of leaving the house. This, paired with the broader shift in consumer behavior across all generations, means brick and mortars need to find new ways to compete with digital to inspire visits and sales. Stores are evolving and, along the way, challenging the very notion of what a store is for.

Up against digital

A big part of brick and mortar’s evolution is digital integration. Today, retailers are working to enhance and personalize customer experience by connecting to consumers in-store through their mobile devices—building apps, targeting ads, and using beacons. You can find many examples of digital integration today, though online retailer Rebecca Minkoff’s flagship store in New York offers one of the more comprehensive ones; its interactive wall and dressing rooms have been credited with tripling expected clothing sales. Timberland also just launched its first connected store while Nordstrom’s commitment to digital integration has been credited with 50% growth in revenue over 5 years. (They just hired a former Amazon exec to serve as CTO.) Target, too, is getting into the mix, launching an LA25 initiative where it’s testing 50 of its top enhancements in 25 Los Angeles stores.

The IRL advantage

But digital integration is not the only strategy; retailers can also draw on the in-real-life [IRL] advantages of the physical space. Immediacy comes in here, with more retailers enabling online ordering and pick up in store or curbside. It’s competitive because fewer exclusively online retailers can offer this instant gratification, but is not necessarily a long-term strategy given that online fulfillment will continue to evolve and speed up.

More effective is the opportunity to build community. Oftentimes, this comes in the form of caffeine; Barnes and Noble was an early innovator here, adding a Starbucks to a New Jersey store back in 1993. Since then, many retailers have adopted or tested in-store cafes, including Urban Outfitters, Target, Restoration Hardware, and Kohl’s. Along the same lines, Target, Whole Foods, and Nordstrom, among others, are offering cocktails in some stores. When trying to attract customers and increase dwell time, there’s an advantage in offering something that can’t be instantly downloaded, like coffee, booze, and yes, maybe even tattoos. (See Whole Foods.)

Meanwhile, another concept that keeps popping up is—ahem—the pop up shop. The pop up shop’s currency is urgency; if customers don’t come now they risk missing out forever. Bloomingdales is hosting a pop up inspired by the musical Hamilton while Macy’s is bringing in pop ups as part of the reinvention of its Brooklyn store. The pop up also presents a low-risk testing ground for online retailers, one compelling example being Warby Parker’s touring store that was housed in a school bus.

But…is it a store?

As brick and mortar adapts, becoming deeper integrated with digital, acting a fulfillment center and expanding to offer drinks and other services, the classic definition of “store” begins to fragment. Already, the “store” has lost its longstanding position as the finale of the customer purchase funnel; in no small part because that purchase funnel itself is an antiquated concept. Savvy retailers and brands in general now think of the consumer experience as an ongoing loop, with consumers moving from digital to physical and back until, eventually, there may be no clear delineation between the two. This emphasis on the overall experience changes the expectations of stores. It also opens opportunities for more types of brands to invest in physical locations.

For example, last year, there was an more than an hour wait at the Museum of Feelings in downtown New York City. The museum invited visitors to walk through a sensory presentation of each feeling: Optimism, Joy, Invigorated, Exhilarated and Calm, while its exterior changed color to reflect the social mood of New York. You might argue that this wasn’t actually a store, but then it wasn’t actually a museum either; The Museum of Feelings was a branded retail experience for Glade, generating buzz for an otherwise not-so-buzzed-about brand.

More recently, Samsung launched Samsung 837, a “first-its-kind cultural destination, digital playground and marketing center of excellence.” Samsung 837 serves as a showcase for innovation, offering what may be the first virtual reality experience for many visitors and providing Instagram-friendly experiences like the walk-through Social Media Gallery. But what’s unique about Samsung’s space is that there is nothing sold there. It’s an experience—an opportunity for Samsung to tell its story and give visitors a way to get excited about the brand they’ll buy in the future.

In cases like these, brick and mortars serve as a marketing vehicle—an opportunity for brands to curate their own presence for customers, just as social provided the format to operate as a media company. It’s a trend that makes Amazon’s decision to open its own brick and mortars seem strategic. But is the return there?

It always comes back to data

The ability to more accurately track consumer activity gives brick and mortars a host of insights. Not only can the more connected store know what was purchased, they can also see what products compelled the most research, price comparisons, or inspired trips to the fitting room. They can engage with in-store customers via social media as well as encourage and measure posts from their store and, increasingly, tap into emotional analytics. Further, more sophisticated attribution measurement is making it possible to determine what investments drove traffic to the store, even without purchase.

Though it would be inaccurate to suggest that traffic and sales aren’t still the key performance indicators for most stores, this broader set of data, if put to use, can help a retailer optimize beyond the limits of its four walls—especially critical at a time when stores are closing so rapidly that CNN wrote “Store Closings are the Hottest Trend in Retail.”

Where to go from here

Digital has an odd way of creating challenges and then presenting solutions for those challenges it creates. It offers a range of ways of to add genuine value, from brand awareness to interaction, coupled with pop-up flexibility. If retailers are savvier about embracing this value, they’ll stand a better chance of attracting customers. If not, they’re not only missing out on opportunities in the near term, they’re limiting their future prospects for growth—after all, isn’t it a waste to see a store as a fulfilment outlet?

]]>http://gigaom.com/2016/05/23/whats-a-store-for/feed/4Girl Scouts are mum on tech underpinning of Digital Cookie pushhttp://gigaom.com/2014/12/03/girl-scouts-are-mum-on-tech-underpinning-of-digital-cookie-push/
http://gigaom.com/2014/12/03/girl-scouts-are-mum-on-tech-underpinning-of-digital-cookie-push/#commentsWed, 03 Dec 2014 15:23:55 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=897101This week’s news that the Girl Scouts of USA has gotten over its aversion to e-commerce and will allow sales of its iconic (and delicious) cookies online was reported everywhere. But there has been little disclosure on what technologies it’s using.

Via email, Chief Digital Cookie Executive Sarah Angel-Johnson said only that the organization is using “world class IT tools and partners such as Hybris and Accenture,” but that’s it. Hybris is a Swiss e-commerce specialist purchased by SAP last year. [company]Accenture[/company] is a huge systems integrator with ties to [company]Microsoft[/company] and, well most tech companies, frankly. (For what it’s worth, Angel-Johnson was formerly a long-timer at IBM, according to her LinkedIn profile.)

Other than that, all a spokeswoman would say in response to questions is that ABC Baker, one of the Girl Scouts’ two cookie suppliers, does custom development using the [company]Microsoft[/company] ASP.Net web app framework and the C# language. The mobile apps support iOS and Android devices, which we already knew. And there is no reliance on [company]Amazon[/company] Web Services, Microsoft Azure or [company]Google[/company] Cloud, nor on any of the big marketing automation software companies.

Given that this is nearly an $800 million business, it’ll be worth keeping an eye on how this effort turns out and which vendors are involved.

Kelly Parisi, who heads communications for the GSUSA told USA Today that scouts will still be encouraged to sell door to door. “We are girl-led and girl-driven. We go where girls are, and girls are digital natives,” she said. “The digital component will enhance the sales, and the byproduct will be a larger social imprint from the girls.”

First, in a trip back to Business 101, your marketing strategy is your commerce strategy. You hitch your transactions to the product pitch — not the other way around. Transactions are just about closing the loop, and the combination of buttons versus users trying to click to seal the deal won’t convert any transactions on its own.

Second (and perhaps more concerning), is that after all the work a company has put into a really comprehensive outbound marketing program, it isn’t looking for a gimmick to captivate users into buying.

I get it. Retailers, banks, and consumers all want frictionless transactions, and nobody wants to be the tragically unhip company that can’t meet its users on their terms. But let’s put things in perspective: There are countless ways to allow users to transact on their mobile devices, and some are certainly more elegant and efficient than others. Technology, however, is not a strategy, and while a lousy checkout can definitely lose a sale, a good one is rarely the reason a consumer decides to buy.

“Mobile commerce” is not a thing

“Mobile commerce” is a bit of a rabbit hole. As a concept it makes sense to look at all the ways in which users will transact on their mobile devices. But mobile commerce encompasses a number of entirely different spaces. A Square-enabled mobile POS, a video game offering in-app purchases, FeLiCa’s tap-to-pay system at train stations, and a retailer’s mobile-enabled website all fit the criteria, but there’s very little overlap. The spectrum of mobile commerce into can be divided into six distinct areas:

The trick with mobile commerce is treating it as a checkbox rather than a top-level strategy. Users must be able to transact on their phones, one way or another — that’s a given. But the how of it is determined by the marketing strategy and customer experience. The correct method may not necessarily fit your competitors, and that’s OK.

Diverging trends

App engagement is up but the number of apps with which users interact has plateaued. In that world, Facebook has the scale and stickiness to create its own payment system, but few others share that luxury. Social game developers might look to Facebook credits as a payment option that could work across devices, while a business like Lyft, whose success depends entirely on its app, can focus on third-party mobile-only payments like Google Wallet.

Starbucks built its own mobile commerce platform as an extension to its existing infrastructure, bringing transactions, loyalty points to the phone in a simple, straightforward package that both complemented and mirrored its offline experience. As Kristina Yee writes in a forthcoming Gigaom Research report, these proprietary “closed ecosystems” will gain ground, despite a complete lack of standardization. At the same time, most of the world’s retailers lack Starbucks’ lock-in, and for those companies, a more lightweight mobile commerce channels may be more appropriate. A properly tuned mobile front-end to an existing Web-based commerce engine may be more than sufficient to service users needs. If it can leverage a user’s existing stored credentials (like an Amazon or Google storefront), the Web-based solution may save time and headaches for customers and developers.

Mobile commerce is an important part of any retailer’s strategy, but it isn’t a strategy in itself. It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on what’s new (and we’re happy to help our clients do that), but if we focus on the business case first, the technology choices will be obvious.

]]>http://gigaom.com/2014/08/24/the-future-of-mobile-commerce-is-commerce/feed/2Etsy acquires French handmade ecommerce company A Little Markethttp://gigaom.com/2014/06/23/etsy-acquires-french-handmade-ecommerce-company-a-little-market/
http://gigaom.com/2014/06/23/etsy-acquires-french-handmade-ecommerce-company-a-little-market/#commentsMon, 23 Jun 2014 23:36:49 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=852649Online marketplace Etsy, which has made its name in selling handmade goods from independent vendors, announced on Monday that it acquired A Little Market — an ecommerce shop based in France that also focuses on handmade goods. The Wall Street Journal reported that the acquisition is the largest from Etsy to date, although the terms of the deal have not been disclosed. The company says that A Little Market will continue to function independently, providing domestic goods in France. The company has been on a bit of a buying spree, as it acquired technology ecommerce company Grand St. in April of this year.
]]>http://gigaom.com/2014/06/23/etsy-acquires-french-handmade-ecommerce-company-a-little-market/feed/4Armed with 7 million data points, True&Co launches new bra sizing spectrumhttp://gigaom.com/2014/06/10/armed-with-7-million-data-points-trueco-launches-new-bra-sizing-spectrum/
Tue, 10 Jun 2014 13:00:30 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=848444While it is difficult finding the proper fit for any clothing garment, those looking for a new bra have their work cut out for them. Not only do bras come in a variety of band and cup sizes that are analogous (for example, a 32 B and a 34 C are nearly the same), but sizes can vary greatly across manufacturers. Data-driven lingerie startup True&Co., which formally launched in 2012, said on Tuesday that it is taking sizing to another level by launching a color spectrum wheel tool that suggests bras based on 7 million different data points and 6,000 different body types .

True & Co is an ecommerce company that offers users a selection of bras and underwear based on a two-minute “fit quiz” that helps determine proper sizing. Users then pick out a selection of bras for a “try-on” process, keeping the ones they like and sending the others back along with proper feedback about fit. In addition to selling a wide range of third-party manufacturers, True&Co. is also developing their own products.

At launch, there are 8 new “colors” on True & Co.’s new “TrueSpectrum” designed to work alongside traditional sizing to help True&Co’s users find a better fitting bra. Users who take the company’s standard quiz after June 10 will receive their color alongside their standard band and cup sizes. No more than a third of True&Co’s users fit into a particular color group: “Citrine,” which corresponds to the “full and round” shape, encompasses the sizing of roughly 28 percent of women, while “Mulberry,” which corresponds to the “full on the sides” shape, represents just 3 percent. True&Co’s CEO, Michelle Lam, told me that the system is scalable, and the company has purposefully left colors untouched to bring even more shapes to market.

In addition to the new sizing, True&Co launched a 15-piece line of lingerie, entitled “Uniform,” designed to take advantage of the new sizing. Users who shop the line will be able to narrow down choices by color as well as size. Since launching its own line in October of last year, the company says that it has grown 500 percent in revenue, with its own products making up a quarter of overall sales. The company says that it currently has roughly 500,000 members.

Check out Michelle Lam’s presentation back at Gigaom’s Roadmap conference last year:

]]>In order to chase down fashion recommendations, eBay turns to neurological datahttp://gigaom.com/2014/05/29/in-order-to-chase-down-fashion-recommendations-ebay-turns-to-neurological-data/
http://gigaom.com/2014/05/29/in-order-to-chase-down-fashion-recommendations-ebay-turns-to-neurological-data/#commentsThu, 29 May 2014 20:55:43 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=845669Fashion taste is a fickle thing, but scientists have long pursued the neurological causes behind our aesthetic choices. We are still far from understanding the motives, but MIT Technology Review reports that a team at eBay Research Labs in San Jose is using neurology research and in-person opinions to help craft an algorithm that determines fashion combinations — ideally to be used to recommend clothing during shopping experiences.

In order to test the strength of recommendations, researcher Anurag Bhardwaj and his team developed two different kinds of algorithms to put in front of human subjects. The first algorithm analyzed the colors of clothing found in more than 13,000 different photographs, seeking out the best match for a given article of clothing (based on an undisclosed rating system) compared to the other possible matches in the database. The second algorithm operated on a much simpler premise: a patterned piece of clothing looks best with a solid piece of clothing.

The researchers surveyed 150 subjects from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, asking them to rate the algorithms’ success based on the number of successful matches made.

While the researchers gained important insights — including the fact that many of the users noted more successful matches with simpler patterns than complex patterns — the report still shows the obstacles researchers face in finding a data-driven (if user-curated) algorithm for something as subjective as fashion. Particularly, one fashion result may work for one person and not the other, so an algorithm must be sophisticated enough to collect nuanced individual data about one user’s particular tastes. It’s a tough problem to solve, but unlocking that potential could be a major boon for ecommerce companies like eBay in the long run.

]]>http://gigaom.com/2014/05/29/in-order-to-chase-down-fashion-recommendations-ebay-turns-to-neurological-data/feed/1Ecwid raises $5M to help websites run online storeshttp://gigaom.com/2014/05/28/ecwid-raises-5m-to-help-websites-run-online-stores/
Wed, 28 May 2014 11:30:39 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=844779E-commerce startup Ecwid brought in $5 million in series B funding on Wednesday, raising the company’s total funding to $6.5 million. The company helps small-to-medium sized businesses create online stores that can be hosted on their websites.

Ecwid’s product is essentially a widget that can be embedded into the code of an organization’s website similar to how one would embed a YouTube video to display a video, said Ecwid’s president Jim O’Hara. While big-name companies like Wal-Mart have the resources available to construct their own online stores with relative ease, small-to-medium sized businesses that may have constructed their own sites on popular open-source web-building services like Drupal do not have the luxury to craft online marketplaces to hawk their wares from the ground up.

The company claims that its users are not forced to use a particular website platform or content management system, because the JavaScript widget can be plopped into an already functioning site and take on its visual characteristics. The product can also be embedded into a company’s Facebook page; Ecwid asserts that it’s the most popular store-building app on Facebook.

While there are other e-commerce platforms available like Shopify, Bigcommerce and Magento, O’Hara said his company’s product differs in that it is hosted natively on a client’s website as opposed to being displayed on a remote window. Because it is hosted natively, a user can manage the widget within one’s content management system.

Supposedly, the widget will not hamper a website’s speed, O’Hara said, because the widget consists of only a few lines of code and will not add to overhead. Additionally, O’Hara claimed that his product adheres to common SEO protocols and ensures that the a website will still be indexed.

“Part of the trick is still accounting for [search-engine] optimization that is required,” O’Hara said. “If buyers cant find them, they aren’t successful.”

The company offers a freemium service for companies that wish to sell less than 10 products on their sites. If a company wants to bulk up on its storefront, it would have to participate in a monthly subscription plan based on how many items it wants to sell.

So far, the San Diego-based firm touts 500,000 registered merchants spanning the whole world, however O’Hara would not mention how many of those 500,000 merchants are paying customers or freemium users. He did say that the rate of converting freemium users to playing clients is “well above the industry standard.”

Ecwid was spun out of the online shopping platform X-Cart in 2009. The company has 65 employees, of which a portion works on development in Russia.

iTech Capital was the primary backer of this round of funding with Runa Capital, Ecwid’s series A funding provider, also contributing. With the cash infusion, the company plans on investing in product development as well as adding to its partner channel, which includes web development companies like Drupal, Joomla, and Wix.

]]>Still struggling, Fab will cut 80-90 employees tomorrowhttp://gigaom.com/2014/05/21/still-struggling-fab-will-cut-80-90-employees-tomorrow/
http://gigaom.com/2014/05/21/still-struggling-fab-will-cut-80-90-employees-tomorrow/#commentsThu, 22 May 2014 00:50:16 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=843724It seems that hard times are continuing for struggling e-commerce startup Fab, as a company spokesperson confirmed to Buzzfeed today that it will lay of 80 to 90 employees — roughly a third of its current staff — in meetings tomorrow. The news comes as the team has spent the last six months putting together a line of sofas, which launched on Tuesday, in an effort to pivot from flash deals. The past year hasn’t been the greatest for Fab: Once worth roughly $1 billion to investors, the company shed 200 employees over two different layoffs in 2013 and also lost cofounder Bradford Shellhammer.
]]>http://gigaom.com/2014/05/21/still-struggling-fab-will-cut-80-90-employees-tomorrow/feed/2Airbnb mobile update brings last-minute and weekend getaway booking to LA and SFhttp://gigaom.com/2014/05/13/airbnbs-latest-mobile-update-brings-last-minute-and-weekend-getaway-booking-to-la-and-sf/
Tue, 13 May 2014 16:00:20 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=841139Airbnb users in San Francisco and Los Angeles will find it easier to book at a moment’s notice, thanks to an update for both iPhone (s aapl) and Android (s goog). The company announced Tuesday morning that users in those areas will gain access to areas available for booking that evening — or available for the weekend nearby.

Available within the app’s Discover tab, users will be able to see listings nearby that are available to book that evening, as well as hand-selected venues available for spur-of-the-moment weekend trips. According to Joe Zadeh, Airbnb’s director of product, the two new sections are natural extensions of the company’s recently deployed Instant Book feature, which allows users to book rooms and apartments without prior approval from hosts.

“In general, we’re trying to make it easier to host, and Instant Book helps with that,” Zadeh said via phone. “On the guest side, we want to make an Airbnb experience available anytime, anywhere.”

Theses features, with the speed of Instant Book, allow Airbnb to take on other last-minute booking sites, like Hotel Tonight, while doubling down on the company’s commitment to becoming a better matchmaker for hosts and guests. Zadeh said that hosts interested in offering up their properties for last-minute and weekend bookings can say so in their preferences. Users who book through these programs use Airbnb’s Verified ID (which surfaces both the first and last names of users) to add an extra layer of security for hosts, and hosts can choose to only book users who have stayed with them before.

While also last-minute, Weekend Getaways have an added algorithm that shows users properties that are in nearby vacation spots — say Napa for an SF user or San Diego for an LA user. These properties are also available for Instant Book, and are hand-picked for their location as well as their features.

These features are definitely a clear step in Airbnb’s goal of making the service frictionless, but also smart. In taking the reigns to better match hosts with guests, the service actually makes it much easier for all involved to participate. Zadeh said the service will likely roll out slowly to new markets as demand grows.

]]>Amazon introduces Dash, a scanner and recorder for Amazon Freshhttp://gigaom.com/2014/04/04/amazon-introduces-dash-a-scanner-and-recorder-for-amazon-fresh/
http://gigaom.com/2014/04/04/amazon-introduces-dash-a-scanner-and-recorder-for-amazon-fresh/#commentsFri, 04 Apr 2014 22:40:29 +0000http://gigaom.com/?p=832434Amazon (s amzn) is has a new twist in its plan to enter the grocery market with a new hardware product introduced Friday: Amazon Dash, a combination barcode scanner and voice recorder that syncs up to the shopping cart on Amazon Fresh.

After connecting to Wi-Fi and linking to a valid Amazon Fresh account, the Amazon Dash can scan the barcodes of items and automatically add that item to a shopping cart. Users can also say a general name of an item, like “carrots” or “eggs,” and the Dash will send the corresponding product to the cart as well. Users must approve the items within the cart for delivery, and then the shipment will show up to the door within 24 hours.

Screenshot from fresh.amazon.com/dash

Amazon Fresh has had an iPhone and Android app, available for iPhone (s aapl) and Android (s goog), that has this exact functionality, but it seems that Dash is designed to be kid-friendly and straightforward. It also shows that Amazon is taking this grocery business seriously.

Right now, Amazon Fresh serves the San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Seattle areas. Amazon Dash is available for free via invitation.